Best way to honor nation's war dead is to stay the course

May 28, 2006|By ANDREW J. DeKEVER

Memorial Day will soon be upon us. As in years past, most Americans will spend this solemn event relaxing on a day off from work, or firing up the barbecue in the backyard. A few people will spend it at ceremonies honoring those men and women in uniform who have given their lives in the service of our country. At many of these ceremonies, dignitaries will honor our military dead with words such as "self-sacrifice," "freedom," "duty" and "patriotism," always culminating by expressing "the thanks of a grateful nation." The majority of these ceremonies will also quote from Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg Address. Almost five years now into the global war on terrorism, one section of this famous speech stands out to me in particular: "It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us ... that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion ... that we here highly resolve that these men shall not have died in vain." The tragedy of this Memorial Day is that these words will, for the most part, go into one ear of most Americans and then right out the other. Perhaps we've heard them spoken so many times that we've stopped paying attention to what Lincoln was trying to say. For whatever reason we've not taken these words to heart, the bottom line is that today we are in danger of failing to respect Lincoln's timeless wisdom. Large segments of the American population have been protesting for an American withdrawal from Iraq ever since Saddam Hussein's statue was toppled in April 2003. These voices have grown louder and more numerous in the years since then, to the point today where even die-hard Republicans are pressuring the president to immediately set a time-table for withdrawal. Even though it has taken more than three years for the American death toll in Iraq to surpass that of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, the relentless media coverage of the American body count has demoralized this country to the point where most Americans want us to cut and run from Iraq immediately, even if it means seeing the Iraqi democracy collapse into civil war. The Bush administration has made the case before for what the consequences of a premature withdrawal from Iraq would entail -- a loss of American credibility in the Middle East and across the world, the collapse of a fledgling democracy that we have a moral obligation to support and the hijacking of Iraq into an Taliban-style safe haven for Osama bin Laden and the murderers of al-Qaida. I won't elaborate anymore on these points, but will add one more that has been overlooked by the American public -- namely, the fact that the collapse of the Iraqi democracy would be an insult to every American service member who has died or sacrificed of themselves there. The men and women of the U.S. armed forces represent the best and brightest that our nation has to offer. They possess the intelligence and skill to succeed in any walk of civilian life, yet they have instead chosen to subordinate their well-being in order to pledge their lives to the service of our country, knowing full well in the post-9/11 world that this means facing the horrors and dangers of combat. If the United States were to abandon Iraq and Afghanistan before these countries can defend their fledgling democracies against the likes of Osama bin Laden and al-Qaida, then the lives of every soldier, sailor, Marine, airman or Coast Guardsman who has died there would have been lost in vain. We must never forget that we, as a nation, decided in 2001 and 2003 that Iraq and Afghanistan were worth the shedding of American blood. As Lincoln's words remind us, our sacrifices in these troubled countries have "consecrated" our missions there "far above our poor power to add or detract." To cut our losses and retreat from Iraq and Afghanistan before achieving victory would only serve to dishonor the memory of every life that has been lost there and to disgrace the sacrifices of every veteran of the global war on terrorism, and those of their families. In short, it would send the message to our military that, in the eyes of their fellow Americans, they are nothing more than commodities that can be expended and wasted without a second thought. On Memorial Day 2003, I stood on Balad Airfield, Iraq, and read the names of all 162 American service members who had been killed since the start of Operation Iraqi Freedom, punctuated then by the mournful notes of "Taps." That list of names, as of this writing, would include more that 2,400 in Iraq and around 300 in Afghanistan. Many of them are buried in West Point National Cemetery, on the grounds of the U.S. Military Academy where I now work. The reality of their sacrifices is a daily occurrence here, whether it be the procession of funeral cars past my office window, or the regular notice in the post newspaper about another West Pointer who has been killed in action, or my frequent walks through Section 36 of the cemetery. In Section 36, you will find 1st Lt. Garrison Avery (Iraq), 1st Lt. Dennis Zilinski (Iraq), 1st Lt. Laura Walker (Afghanistan), and Capt. Vincent Generoso (Iraq) buried side-by-side. A few feet away from them, you will find the final resting places of Maj. William Hecker III (Iraq) and Capt. Stephen Frank (Iraq). A short distance from them are buried, side-by-side, Capt. Michael MacKinnon and Capt. Ralph Harting, both of whom were killed in Iraq. More West Point casualties from the global war on terrorism can also be found in their immediate vicinity. The loss of each of these precious lives is a tragedy, but the greater tragedy would be the thought they were lost in vain because we lacked the resolve as a nation to complete our mission in Iraq and Afghanistan. On this Memorial Day, never forget that the best way to honor these heroic dead and to "Support the Troops" is not to fly the flag or to place a yellow ribbon magnet on your car. Rather, it is to stay the course and to finish what we started in these countries. Anything less would only serve to dishonor Walker, Avery, Generoso and every one of our sons and daughters who have given the "last full measure of devotion" to keep us all safe. A Mishawaka native, Andrew J. DeKever is a graduate of the University of Notre Dame and a veteran of Operation Iraqi Freedom. He lives in West Point, N.Y.